Tag: Sermon

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Hebrews 1: Why Jesus Came

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry and Bluemont Churches
Hebrews 1
January 3, 2021

Sermon recorded on January 2, 2021

At the beginning of worship, in preparation: 

Today, I’m beginning a series of sermons on the Book of Hebrews. My plan is to preach through this book, with a break around Easter, and complete the study in April or May. I enjoy preaching through longer sections of scripture, for each sermon builds on the previous one. We can dig deeper into scriptures and to catch passages ignored by the lectionary.[1]

Role of Hebrews 

 Hebrews is an important book within the New Testament cannon. Sadly, in over 35 years, I have only preached from a half a dozen of its passages. Yet, this book grounds our Christological, our understanding of Jesus Christ. While the writing seems somewhat complicated, the message is simple. It’s all about Jesus Christ. Through him, God is doing something new and wonderful in the world. Prophets and priest and angels played an important role in how God communicated in the past, but now God has spoken in a new way, though his Son.

 It is essential for us, as Christians, to understand that if we have Christ, we don’t need to have anyone or anything else. Too often, even the faithful succumb to the temptation of looking for a savior in all the wrong places: a political figure or party, a spouse, a friend, a job, or even a hobby. The book of Hebrews reminds us that Jesus is all we need. Any other want-a-be saviors will result in disappointment. 

Importance of Christology 

As Christians and as the church, if we long to be faithful, we must have a solid Christology. We must be grounded in an understanding of what God has and is doing in Jesus Christ. I hope you’ll enjoy this journey through his interesting book.   

After the reading of Scripture 

A Story of Christmas

This is the second Sunday of Christmas, there’s time for another Christmas story. 

There was a farmer who was a good man, but he had a hard time accepting the faith. That’s okay, you don’t have to have faith to be good. This man allowed his wife to attend church with the kids. He enjoyed his Sunday mornings at home, putting around the barn.

One Christmas Eve, his wife tried to get him to attend church with her and the kids, but he refused. I’ll just sit and read a book and wait for you to return, he said. When she insisted and wanted to know why he wouldn’t attend, he said it is because the story is nonsense. “Why would God lower himself to come to earth as a man?” he asked.

The family left, disappointed, as he began to read his book. Outside it snowing and cold. The light was draining from the gray sky. Immersed in his book, he was shaken when he heard a thump. Then another thump. He looked out the window and saw a flock of birds around the house and realized they were flying into the window in an attempt to escape the cold. 

“They must have been migrating,” he thought, “and got caught in the storm.”  

He worried about the birds. Finally, he had an idea.  Pulling on his boots and putting on his coat and hat, he went into the storm that was becoming a blizzard. He made his way over to the barn and opened the door thinking that the birds could seek shelter there. But none of them would fly in that direction. He tried to shoo them into the barn, but they scattered. He went back inside and grabbed some bread and crumbed it up and sprinkled it on the ground. The birds began to eat, so he made a path toward the barn, but they stopped short.

There must be another way, he thought. 

“Do you want to just sit out here and freeze to death,” he asked the birds in desperation. “Why don’t you follow me?”  Of course, the birds didn’t answer. They sat in the snow, their feathers puffed out for warmth, picking at whatever crumbs were left. 

“If only I was a bird,” he thought. “I could come among them and guide them into the barn.”

The story’s conclusion: knowing why Jesus came

            As soon as he said this to himself, the distant church bell began to ring. He could hear it faintly above the wind, but it was clear enough that he recalled how he questioned why God would come to us in the flesh. Suddenly he understood what Christmas was about; why Christ had to come.[2]

            It would be a mistake to see ourselves as the farmer in this story; we start out as one of the birds. We need a savior, like us, to come and show us the way into the barn. 

Jesus is God’s revelation 

Jesus is the complete revelation of God. He came to show and display divine love. He came to help us understand who God is and who we are in relationship to God.  Jesus came to cleanse us from sin so that we might come into God’s presence without fear. Jesus came, as the Gospel of John reminds us, to show us the way to the Father.[3]

The “Letter” to the Hebrews

This passage is from the “Letter to the Hebrews.” But this isn’t a letter or an epistle like others in the New Testament. The writings of Paul and Peter, James and John, have the hallmarks of letters. Hebrews is different. Some suggest it may have originally been a sermon,[4] for instead of beginning with the greeting and niceties of a letter, the author starts with the one premise that makes all the difference in the world: God has spoken! 

The author of this sermon reminds his readers that God had been speaking to their ancestors all along, through prophets. But now God has spoken in an even better way, through a Son. God realizes, like that farmer, that the way to reach people is to come as one of them. This is the purpose of Jesus coming.

Superiority of Christ

One of the themes of Hebrews is the superiority of Jesus Christ to both human servants of God (prophets) and divine servants or messages of God (angels). While Jesus is a messenger, showing us the way, he’s more than that!   

Historically, the church has spoken of Christ holding three offices: prophet, priest and king. In all three, Christ surpasses human prophets, human priests, and human kings.[5] Throughout this book, the author goes into great detail to show Christ’s preeminence which he proclaims here at the beginning with a sevenfold confirmation of Jesus superiority: 

1. He is appointed heir of all, 
2. The is the creator of the world,
3. He is the refection of God’s glory, 
4. He is the exact imprint of God, 
5. He upholds all things by his power, 
6. He purifies our sin and 
7. He sits at God’s right hand.[6]

Revealing the Divine Nature

God, by coming to us in Jesus Christ, reveals the nature of the divine in a way we can understand. That’s why Jesus name is more excellent than all other names, as we’re told in verse 4. Jesus Christ, our prophet, our priest and our king, came to show us God’s glory. Christ also forgives and frees us to be God’s agents in the world.  

The role of angels 

After this elegant opening of this book, the preacher begins the first of his polemics. The Son, Jesus Christ, is superior to angels. Now, we hear a lot about angels during the Christmas season. They inform Mary and Joseph of the plans, they call the shepherds to the stable, they warn the wisemen to avoid Herod. So just what is an angel? In the biblical sense, angels are messengers, nothing more.

In a sermon about the angel who met the women at Jesus’ tomb, Alyce McKenzie, a professor at Perkin’s School of Theology, relates the angels in Matthew’s gospel to her UPS man. They’re both focused on their job: delivering a package or delivering a message. Think of your UPS driver. He’s not there to be your buddies, or to sell you something, or open your package. He hands you the package and, if needed, obtains a signature, thanks you, and goes on his way. Angels are like that. They give their message and then it’s up to us.[7]

Jesus’ superiority to angels

Now, any message from God is important, but we are not to make angels out to be the end-all. The preacher’s first task in Hebrews is to make this clear. Jesus, the Son, the second person of the Trinity, is superior to the angels. He’s worshipped by angels. The son is eternal. Everything else (and we can infer this includes angels) are created beings. Angels weren’t there at the beginning, they have no status over our savior, and they won’t have that cherished seat at the right hand of the Father. 

However, angels have an important role to play in God’s plan of salvation. As the last verse indicates, God uses them to lead the chosen into salvation.

So, while God may speak to us through an angel (and the preacher later admits that sometimes we entertain angels without knowing it[8]), they themselves are not nearly as important as the message they bring.   

Knowing God

So how do we know God? While angels may give us insight into what God wants us to do, or point us in the right direction, their message is limited. The way we know God, as pointed out in the beginning of this book, is through God’s divine revelation in Jesus Christ. Jesus, the more excellent way, is how God makes himself known. 

During the Christmas season, which is coming to an end, we celebrate what happened at the stable in Bethlehem so long ago. God came into the world and through Jesus showed the world his love. 

Knowing God means…

But the story doesn’t end in Bethlehem or at the cross or even at the empty tomb. With Jesus now in our hearts, we are to be the ones reflecting his love to the world so that all people might experience the joy of salvation and have hope.

I will end with a poem by Howard Thurman, titled, “The Work of Christmas.”

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flocks,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among the people,
To make music in the heart. [9]. Amen.

ã2021

[1] As an example, the lection links the first four verses of Hebrews with the opening of the second chapter and omits the section (1:5-12) on angels. 

[2] I’m not sure where I first heard this story.

[3] John 14:6.

[4] See Hugh Montefiore, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews (New York: Harper and Row, 1964), 33 and Thomas G. Long, Hebrews(Louisville: John Knox Press, 1997), 2-3. Another thory is that it was written as a letter to be read to congregations. See Luke Timothy Johnson, Hebrews (Louisville: WJKP, 2006), 10, 33. .

[5] See the Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 7 and the Westminster Larger Catechism, Questions 152-155.

[6] F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 3-8.

[7] Alyce M. McKenzie, Novel Preaching: Tips from Top Writers on Crafting Creative Sermons (Louisville: WJK, 2010), 137-138. 

[8] Hebrews 13:2.

[9] Poem published in The Mood of Christmas and Other Celebrations, published by Friends United Press. I found the poem at https://mypastoralponderings.com/2020/12/31/the-work-of-christmas-by-howard-thurman/?c=1119#comment-1119

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A Prayer for God to Enter History

The sermon prerecorded on December 23rd

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry and Bluemont Churches
December 27, 2020
Isaiah 64

At the beginning of worship, in preparation: 

Jesus’ birth came at an interesting time. Luke provides the historical setting: Augustus ruled as emperor, Quirinius was governor, and a major census was underway. On one hand, it was a time of stability. But the peace was fragile, maintained by terror and force, as I pointed out last week.

In Simply Jesus, N. T. Wright tells Jesus’ story by delving into the background of this world. As an analogy, he draws upon the story of the fishing trawler, Andrea Gail. If you read the book or seen the movie, you’ll remember she was lost in the North Atlantic during a storm created by the confluence of three weather systems: The Perfect Storm.  

This first century perfect storm involved the confluence of the Roman world. Their infrastructure provides the means for the message to get out after Jesus’ resurrection. Second, the Jewish world longed for the Messiah and hated the Romans, which set up conflict. The sovereign wind of God was the third “storm,” challenging everyone’s assumptions.[1]

What does it mean for God to come among us?

When God comes into our midst, we need to be careful. Such presence is dangerous. Things will be shaken up. And that’s what happened when God came as a child born in Bethlehem. Today, we’ll go back into a world without Jesus as we explore Isaiah 64. The prophet cries out for God to intervene. Would we be so brave? 

After the reading of Scripture: 

Although Isaiah lived centuries before the birth of Jesus, they resided in a similar world. As a small nation, Israel served as a pawn on an international scene dominated by foreign armies. It started with the Egyptians, then the Assyrians, and the Babylonians. The march would continue with the Persians, the Greeks and finally the Romans. This world of power spins around Israel. God’s people become dizzy and feel lost and abandoned. The prophet’s cry captures their anguish.  

The need for God to enter history:

This is a cry of lament! Isaiah knows God is not locked up in the heavens. God exists! God listens. God hears. Tearing open the heavens is metaphorical language. God’s present! It’s just that God doesn’t seem to be doing anything. Israel would like to see some tangible evidence. Therefore, the prophet calls on God to reveal himself in a manner that his presence will be unmistakable. Israel wants God to show up and scare the pants off her enemies.

You know, Isaiah’s request is a familiar one. We’d all like to witness such power. I’ve been told many times by individuals that if he or she just had a sign, just a piece of tangible evidence, it’d make all the difference. But would it? After all, the Hebrew children in the wilderness witnessed God’s power and fury with the plagues and the parting of the sea. Yet they still continued to turn from God. The disciples witnessed Jesus’ miracles, and they still denied him. 

There’s just something about us wanting God to step into history and to solve our problems. We want God to be on our side. We want God to do our bidding. 

It’s as if it’s after school and we’re in a pickup basketball game. We want to choose God for our team. We forget that we don’t choose God. God chooses us! Instead of us trying to lure God over to our team, we should make sure we’re on his team.

Isaiah 64: A Prayer of Lament 

       This prayer, or lament, of Isaiah’s can be divided into four parts. If we separate them, we can better understand the prophet’s theology. 

An appeal to history

The first five verses ask God to act because God has acted in the past. Isaiah knows what God has done for the Hebrew people; therefore, he bases his request on past history. Asking God to come down is an appeal for God to act in the world—to enter human history on behalf of his people.   

You may be in the situation of Isaiah, knowing God but only in the past tense. Do you think God stopped acting with Jesus or the Apostles, or maybe with your baptism or confirmation? If so, join in Isaiah’s lament. Cry out for God to make himself known once again. God is the capable of meeting our innermost longings. We cry out to the Almighty, who already knows our needs. Our cries led us to reevaluate our lives and how we relate to God. This is what happens to Isaiah.

The need for confession: 

       Isaiah, after recalling God’s past grace, reflects on his and his people’s sinfulness. The second part of the petition involves confession. In verses five through seven, Isaiah admits the problems from which they need deliverance are result of their disobedience.[2] They have sinned; they are guilty; they need God to pull them out of the deep and troubling water.  

Here again we often find ourselves in the situation of Isaiah. At such times, we should ask ourselves what we have done to cause God to seem so far away. Do we turn our backs on our Savior? Is the problem with us? Probably, and we need to confess those sins which drive us away from God’s holiness. We need to root out our indifferences toward God that cause Him to seem so distant.

Affirmation: 

       The third part of this lament affirms a trust in God while continuing to plea for God’s help. In a fashion reminiscence of Moses, who shamed God when the Lord wanted to destroy the people after the fashioning of the golden calf, Isaiah reminds God that the Israelites are his people.[3]“God,” he says, “those destroyed cities are your cities; that ruined temple is your temple.” God has big shoulders and Isaiah brings his petition before God, dropping his concerns on the Almighty.

Waiting:

Next, Isaiah waits. There is nothing more to do but to carry on as he waits for God’s answer.

       In the fourth verse of this chapter, we are told God works for those who wait. And when we think about it, much of scripture is about God’s people waiting on God. Abraham and Sarah waiting for a child; the Hebrew slaves waiting in bondage; those exiled in Babylon waiting for release; the waiting for the Messiah. 

It’s now our turn to wait for Christ’s return. At times, at least within the measurement of human history, God seems slow to act. Yet, in the meantime, we are to wait faithfully. Our willingness to wait reflects our trust in the Almighty.

Our lack of interest in waiting:

       But our culture doesn’t value waiting. We want things immediately! Instant gratification! Fast food and faster computers, interstate highways and supersonic jets. Instead of mailing a letter, we zip ‘em off by email, or we shoot a text and expect an almost immediate response. We don’t make time, nor do we have time to wait. We need that vaccine NOW! 

This lack of interest in waiting is true in religion, too. We want immediate salvation. We want to accept Christ and all-of-a-sudden have everything better. We want to have our spiritual longings filled, instantly! But it doesn’t work that way. Anything worthwhile takes time.

       Even the church stands guilty. “We read one-minute Bibles, pray through five-minute devotions, wander from one conference to another to get five keys to Spiritual success,” we’re told. “We except Spiritual maturity in 40 days of purpose-filled studies… One of the lies of the world is that we can have instant discipleship. We think we’re tourist, after instant gratification, forgetting we’re pilgrims in for the long haul to our new heavenly home.”[4]

Advent emphasizes waiting:

       We’ve just finished four weeks of Advent, a season of waiting. During these weeks, we were reminded of the centuries God’s people waiting for the Messiah, even as we wait for his return. As we saw last week, God encourages us to be still. We might substitute the word “wait.” We are still and we wait, and then we know God.[5]  At times, waiting may be our only real option. We can barge ahead without God and screw everything up, or we can patiently wait for God’s direction.

Isaiah is far from inactive:

       You know, the ironic thing about this passage is that even while Isaiah calls upon God to come down from the heavens and make himself known, God was there. At the beginning of Chapter 65, God replies: “I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, ‘Here I am, here I am’ to a nation that did not call my name.” God’s present, but Isaiah’s contemporaries are unwilling to seek Him out. God worked to get Israel out of exile and back to the Promised Land. God forges a new relationship with his people, one that would in time cumulates with the birth of a Savior.  

       Amidst the chaos of the world, God was present just as God is present now in our world. At times, from our point of view, we might wonder where God hides. But, when we look back on where we’ve been, we often realize God has been with us. God guides and works through us to bring about his purposes.  

Opening ourselves for God to change us:

       Let me clarify something. Don’t leave thinking that our waiting on God means no action on our part. Isaiah wasn’t inactive. He was proactive, taking his concerns to God and admitting his and his people’s shortcomings. In so doing, opening himself up for God to reveal himself as we see happening in the 65th chapter of Isaiah.  

Craig Barnes, in Sacred Thirst proposes the point of hope is not just to hold on. I suggest it’s the same for waiting. We hope so we can be free to seek holiness where we find ourselves.[6] And isn’t that what Isaiah does? 

Externally, Isaiah’s situation doesn’t change, even after God replies.[7] But he’s changed. He’s changed because having called upon God and reflected upon his sinfulness, he’s now opened to encounter God and to know God’s presence. Knowing God’s presence makes all the difference. When we know God is with us, we can undergo any obstacles and face any challenges. Amen. 

[1] N. T. Wright, Simply Jesus” A New Vision of Who He Was, What He Did, and Why He Matters (New York: Harper Collins, 2011), 13-56.

[2] It is interesting that Isaiah began by blaming God (we sinned because you away-verse 5).  But the tone changes as he takes responsibility (you have delivered us into the hands of our iniquity-verse 7).

[3] Exodus 32:11-14. See also Numbers 14:13-17.

[4] “Spiritual Shortcuts,” Christianity Today (January 2005), 27. The article is about today’s crisis of cheating, but the author ties it to our lack of interest in waiting and preparing.

[5] Psalm 46:10.

[6] M. Craig Barnes, Sacred Thirst: Meeting God in the Desert of our Longings (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001), 175. Barnes is now the president of Princeton Theological Seminary. This was an earlier book of his while he was pastor of National Capital Presbyterian Church. 

[7] Isaiah 65,

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A Christmas Eve Story

This is a short Christmas program for those at home. I tell the following story in the program followed by “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence”

I have told this story several times including in an article published in Nevada Magazine’s online edition.

1988 was the first time I was without family on Christmas. It was also my first white Christmas. And it was a holy Christmas. I had taken a year off from seminary to serve as a student pastor in Virginia City, Nevada, the old mining town made famous by the TV show, Bonanza.

The week leading up to Christmas had been hectic. To top it off, a zephyr blew in two days before Christmas. I watched the clouds rolled angrily across the Sierras. Soon snow flew. The gale force wind made the frigid air feel even colder. I wore heavy sweaters even inside. By late morning of Christmas Eve, there was enough snow to ski on the streets of Virginia City. Having taken care of everything for the evening service, I joined a group of friends skiing down the old railroad grade to Gold Hill.

When we got back, we stopped by the church to shovel the snow off the steps. I turned up the heat inside. Snow drifted and the high winds made travel dangerous. About an hour before the service, word came that the steep roads into town from Carson City and Reno were closed. Now, my preparedness was for naught. Our “lessons and carols” service featured a number of readers, many of whom lived off the mountain and couldn’t make it in. Howard, our organist, assured me everything would work out. St. Mary’s of the Mountain, the Catholic Church in town, had already contacted him to play for their Midnight Mass as their organist wasn’t able to make it in.

It was a great service. Despite the cold and ice, people from town flocked in. We recruited readers. As the service began, the building creaked and groaned against the gale. At times, wind seeped into the building and caused the candles to flicker. Our worship service closed with candles challenging the dark as we sang “Silent Night.”

Afterwards, a group of us headed to the Mark Twain, one of the many saloons along C Street. We had good conversations while waiting for the midnight hour to head down to St Mary’s of the Mountain for Midnight Mass. We wanted to support Howard, who was playing the organ. 

When I say, “we went down,” that’s just what we did as Virginia City sits on the eastern flank of Mt. Davidson and every block you travel you gain or lose significant elevation.

Sometime during the Mass, the raging storm blew itself out. When we stepped out of the church, clear skies greeted us. Crisp cold air billowed from my mouth like a locomotive. I zipped my coat tight, bid my friends a Merry Christmas and headed home, walking up the hill toward the lighted V, high on Mount Davidson. Snow squeaked under my feet due to the cold. The scent of pinion pine burning in woodstoves filled the air. A few cars were parked by one of the saloons on C Street. Otherwise, the street was deserted. When I reached B Street, where I lived, I was nearly out of breath.  

I paused to survey the town. In a few houses, lights still burned. They stood as cheery refuges from the cold. But most were dark. Folks had settled in for a long winter’s nap. Then I looked up into the dark sky dotted with brilliant stars. Orion the hunter stood high overhead, followed to the southeast by his faithful dog. To the north, the Dipper was rising. Although alone, I felt a presence…

Things had worked out. Our worship serve was special and several of us were blessed with a second service at midnight. Even though my family were thousands of miles away, I was with good friends. And I felt God’s love, a love that had come into this world in a child. 

The hymns and carols of the evening echoed in my head. “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence” seemed appropriate I had experienced something holy and silent awe was a fitting response.

This ancient hymn has its roots in the early church and is used as the beginning of the Communion rite in the Orthodox Churches. In English, we sing the words which recall God’s mystery to Picardy, an old French folk melody. The music is haunting, as it should be when we contemplate the incarnation, God coming to us in the flesh.

This Christmas, may we spend some time in awe, pondering the mystery of what happened so long ago. And while 2020 has appeared as a storm to us, we know that after the storm passes, there are good times. As followers of Jesus, we need to have faith. 

May we also be aware that that child, born in Bethlehem, will come again and claim his throne. That’s where our ultimate hope lies. Until then, we hold on to hope and dedicate ourselves to him, our true Lord and our only Savior. Amen 

C Street, Virginia City, Winter of 1988-89

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Advent 4: Peace

JEFF GARRISON
Bluemont and Mayberry Churches
December 20, 2020
Psalm 46

A recording of the sermon made at Mayberry on Saturday, December 19

Thoughts at the beginning of worship

It’s the fourth Sunday of Advent. Christmas is almost here. Over the past three weeks, we have focused on hope, joy and love. I hope you have learned that these are not just emotions we feel, but actions that we take in response to a God who loves and comes to us. 

Yet, we live in a troubled world. This isn’t anything new. There’s always trouble. Today, our focus is on peace. A Christian view of peace is counter cultural. The world thinks of peace as an absence of war. But what if we could have peace even in the midst of war? That’s what I want us to ponder today. How do we live a peaceful life in the chaos that surrounds us day in and day out? 

After the reading of scripture: 

I may be an outlier, but I have enjoyed much of 2020. Many of you, I’m sure, can’t wait for the year to be done. I hear people talking about starting anew as if there’s something special about midnight on the 31st. There’s not. It’s just another tick of the clock.

However, there’s much about 2020 I’d like to forget. My list includes the pandemic and quarantine, fires in Australia and the American West, the massive numbers of hurricanes, a shortened baseball season, and the closing down of the economy. But still, personally, the year hasn’t been bad for me. After all, I’m in the mountains, My heart sings.

 2016 verses 2020

My bad year was 2016. It started earlier, on January 9th, with a slip on the foredeck of a sailboat. My left foot was pinned by some blocks. I fell backwards with the boat’s lifeline catching my leg just above my knee, so that it couldn’t bend. The strain on my pinned leg was great. Something had to give. My quad tendon snapped. It was the most painful thing I’ve experienced. My leg instantly became worthless. After surgery, my left leg remained in a brace. I couldn’t bend it for three months. Then I could bend it 30 degrees and slowly worked up from there. I spent much of that spring learning, once again, how to walk. 

And then, in late summer, because of a high PSA reading, I had a prostrate biopsy. Those are not pleasant, but that wasn’t the end of it. A week later, I woke at 3 AM, thinking I had the worst flu ever. I had gone to bed feeling fine. I took ibuprofen and tried to get more sleep. At 7, I sent emails to cancel my meetings for the day. When the drugs ran out, I took my temperature—104. Calling my doctor, he said get to the emergency room, pronto. I called Donna. She took me to the hospital. 

I had no idea how sick I was. At the front desk of the ER, they checked my temperature, blood pressure, breathing and heart rate. They had me on a gurney with an IV in my arm before Donna was able to park the car and find her way back inside. I spent the next couple of days in the hospital fighting sepsis, which probably came from the biopsy. Thankfully, the biopsy came back negative. 

A few weeks after that, Hurricane Matthew raked the Georgia Coastline. It was estimated that Skidaway Island lost 20% of its trees. Our paradise island was a mess. A year later, they were still hauling away timber, brush, and wood chips.

But was 2016 a bad year? 

Yet, with all that happened in 2016, I still have some good memories. And these memories are not just from the morphine they gave me for my leg. I never felt alone or so loved. Nor did I feel abandoned by God  

So, while I won’t deny that 2020 has been bad, especially for the families of over 300,000 Americans and the million others around the world who died, for me personally, it doesn’t quite rise to 2016. And, looking back on things, as bad as 2016 was, it wasn’t terrible. For God remained with me, in the midst of my pain. 

The 46th Psalm

The 46th Psalm is about confidence in a God who is present in the midst of a trouble-filled world. The Psalm is divided into three strophes or sections, each assuring us of God’s comfort while reminding us of the problems we face during our walk on this planet. 

First strophe

The first section deals with natural disasters such as earthquakes and volcanoes, hurricanes and tornadoes. 

            Perhaps we’ve not experienced this personally, although there was an earthquake in this area earlier this year. However, parts of our world have experienced all these events in 2020. When faced with such calamities, we may feel abandoned and afraid. But in each situation, the Psalmist reminds us that we should not fear for God is present and in control.  

Second Strophe

The calamity in the second section is not a natural disaster, but one of a human making. Now, war threatens; the hatred of people drives them to ruthlessly attack each other. Kind of sounds like this past election. 

Despite the fact that war is on-going, God’s holy city stands unharmed. Even in the middle of the chaos, God’s city stands untouched. God is sovereign. What can we do, as humans, to challenge God’s sovereignty? God’s city stands as an example of the way it should be. 

Third strophe

And finally, in the third section, we are reminded of God’s judgment. God has the power to bring wars to an end. However, judgement brings destruction; God puts an end to our ability to wage war. God’s holiness demands judgment.  

Visions of noise and chaos and war often demonstrate God’s presence. But here, we find that although God is present, that’s not where we encounter God.

Elijah’s similar encounter

Elijah had a similar experience with God on Horeb. There was a great wind, and God wasn’t in it. There was an earthquake, but God wasn’t in it. And then a fire, but that was not where he encountered God. Instead, after these events, Elijah experiences God in sheer silence. Elijah encounters God in a way that’s a similar to the promise made in the Psalm. Be still and know God.[1]

Be still, let the turmoil of life spin around you, and know that God is there with you.

What does this mean?

            There was a point in my life where I thought this Psalm told me to go to where I could experience stillness and quietness. What a convenient interpretation. I could use it as rational for a backpacking or canoe trip. I still believe that getting away from the turmoil of life can be a spiritual experience, but I no longer believe this Psalm is telling us that we should go hide.  

Another way to interpret the Psalm

Instead, I have another idea what this Psalm means. God sits me down in a chair. All around me things spin out of control. There are things I need to do. In the similar fashion, God lets the Psalmist experience the turmoil of life before revealing himself.

With all this chaos spinning around me, my first through is, “what can I do to fix it.” Isn’t that a human response? I want to do something. But in this chair, God’s hands remain on my shoulders gently encouraging me to stay seated. Then I hear a whisper, “sit still.” The voice is soft and soothing. Such a simple message with a profound implication. 

It’s as if God says, “I’ve got this, let me take this burden from your shoulders.” Even in the midst of all kinds of troubles, we can find peace in our lives and we can know God. 

The theme that’s echoed three times in this Psalm is that God is our refuge, our place where we can find solace.[2]

Psalm 46 and the Coming of Christ

 This Psalm reassures us that even in the chaos, God’s present. God stands by us to comfort. God is in the middle of pain. God comes to us; God doesn’t wait till all is calm and peaceful. 

I wonder if we get a wrong picture of what happened in Bethlehem from our depiction of the nativity. We see the idyllic pastoral view of cows sleeping while shepherds converse around a campfire. And then, later in the night, some wise–dudes dress in fancy clothes rides in on a camel with gifts. Such a peaceful night, but was it? 

Scripture tells another story. Herod and his court burn the midnight oil in Jerusalem, worried that their rule will end. They grasp at straws to see how they can maintain control. Out of fear, they commit a terrible atrocity. And above Herod, we have Caesar and his legions. Roman soldiers keep an iron hand on far-flung parts of the empire like Palestine. 

The world into which Jesus was born

We learn in Luke’s gospel that a decree from Caesar forced Joseph and the pregnant Mary to make a trip to Bethlehem. It was no skin off Caesar’s back, but mighty inconvenient for the Holy Family. 

So, the world wasn’t necessarily peaceful on the day of Jesus’ birth. It was a world like ours, troubled. And everyday citizens like Mary and Joseph, along with the parents of young children in and around Bethlehem, were caught up in the powerplays of those with authority. 

It’s into this kind of world that our Savior was born—a troubled world longing for peace. It’s also into such hearts that Jesus comes… If we’re not sick, Jesus suggests, we don’t need a doctor. But if we realize our human frailties, we’ll run to a physician.[3]

The Psalm in 2020

Be still and know that I am God is a message we need to hear in 2020. When we think we can overcome all our problems, we develop a false sense of pride. We feel we can take care of ourselves; a feeling in which we risk making ourselves into a little god. But when we realize that we are truly not in control, we must turn to God and only then can we discover peace. War may be all around us, but we can be at peace because we are assured that God is with us and, in the end, we’ll be with God. 

That’s why God tells us to be still. In the midst of our troubles, we need to trust the God of creation, the God of redemption, and the God of our future.  When we trust such a God, we can have peace.

In a year like 2020, listen to that voice from God telling us to slow down, to be still, and to know that God who set the stars in the sky, who divided the land and water and separated night from day, the God of the cosmos, is also our refuge and strength.   Amen.

Resources and Notes:

May, James L. Psalms: Interpretation, A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 1994.

Weiser, Artur.  The Psalms: A Commentary, Herbert Hartwell, translator. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1962.

[1] 1 Kings 19:11-18. Interesting in other ways and in other parts of the Old Testament, we find God revealing himself in these other experiences of Isaiah. In Genesis 1, God’s spirit is a wind over the chaos. The word for wind and breath in Hebrew is the root of the word “Spirit.” God also made himself known to Moses with the burning (but not consumed) bush. 

[2] God as refuge appears in the 1st, 7th and 11th verses. 

[3] Matthew 9:12, Mark 2:17, Luke 5:31.

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My Installation as Pastor of Bluemont and Mayberry Churches

On Sunday, December 13, the Presbytery of the Peaks installed me as pastor. Normally, such worship services are filled with clergy from local churches, local politicians are invited, and there’s a big reception afterwards. Not this year. Not with COVID. First of all, we had to do it where we could maintain social distance. Neither church is large enough to have more than 40 people or so safely in worship. We were blessed when Meadows of Dan Baptist Church allowed us to hold the service in their sanctuary.

The Presbytery Commission with me (I’m second to the right)

The service is led by a commission that includes Ruling Elders and Teaching Elders (ministers) from area churches. The Commission included Ruling Elders Rick Rudolph and Mike Nyquist of Mayberry, Ruling Elder Libby Wilcox of Bluemont, Ruling Elder Sue Bentley of Northside Church in Blacksburg, the Reverend Bob McL. of the Presbyterian Church of Floyd, the Reverend Sara Jane Bush Nixon of New Dublin Presbyterian Church, and the Reverend Steve Willis, Vice Moderator of the Presbytery. While there was no singing due to COVID, instrumental music was provided by Joey Webster and Lil. Puckett.

The YouTube Link is to the entire service is below. Under that are the text of Sara Jane’s sermon on Exodus 3:1-11 and Matthew 16:13-18, the charge to me given by Bob, and the charge to the congregation by Libby.

Sermon by the Rev. Sara Jane Nixon

A long, long time ago, God’s people were in slavery. A long time ago, they were being threatened with extinction, literally, with the killing of their children and the death of their adults through long, hard labor. But before that, before their slavery, before they were a nation, before the foundation of the world, before anything that ever was or is or will be was made, God had laid the plan for their redemption. Long before time began, God planned for Moses. And through immense dangers, through genocide, through murder, through exile, God preserved him and kept him. And when the time was right, God got his attention through a burning bush. And he said to him, “Go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people out of Egypt.”

But despite all that effort, despite the plan that had been in place since eternity, despite the fact that we tell this story about Moses so many thousands of years later, it’s remarkable how little of this passage is actually about Moses. It’s the Lord who has seen the misery of his people in Egypt, the Lord who has come to rescue them, the Lord who has come to bring them into a good and spacious land, the Lord who has heard, the Lord who has seen, the Lord who sends. And when Moses asks why him, the Lord has nothing to say about Moses as a person. Nothing about how excellent his moral character is, nothing about his leadership qualities, his extroversion, his teaching abilities. None of that seems to matter. All God has to say on the subject is “I will be with you.” It’s not about Moses. It’s about God. 

And when Moses still has hesitations, still has doubts, God’s reassurance still doesn’t have anything to do with him. “But God, what if they ask me who sent me? What if they ask me, who is the God of our fathers?” God gives a cryptic answer at first: “Tell them ‘I AM’ is my name.” But then he explains further: He’s the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God the ancestors knew. He hasn’t forgotten, he’s still the same. 

Gallons of ink have been spilled over what it might mean for God to say that his name is “I AM.” But it at least seems to imply God’s active presence, active commitment to being the same God at all times and in all places. The God of the fathers – Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – is I AM. The God of Moses and the Exodus is I AM. The God of the future is I AM. “This is my name forever,” says God, “the name you shall call me from generation to generation.” It’s a promise. Who am I? Says God. You’re gonna find out. You’ll find out by my faithfulness, my unfailing love, from generation to generation to generation forever. Whatever else changes, my faithfulness, my commitment, my love for my people will not. That’s how you’ll know me. From generation to generation. Forever. 

And they did. We did. Most of all through the birth and life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God and Son of God, firstborn of all creation, the Word from before the beginning who was made flesh and walked among us, full of grace and truth. But that self-revelation of God in Jesus is not always clear – not at all times, not for all people. It wasn’t even necessarily clear for the people who knew Jesus the best. It’s a secret – a mystery, in the biblical sense of the world. A biblical mystery isn’t like playing Clue,  where you’ve got to figure out who killed the butler in the library with a candlestick. It’s something you need to have revealed to you by someone else. It’s a secret you can’t know unless you’re told. 

And so when Peter comes out with his true and history-changing recognition that Jesus is the Christ, the true king of Israel, the Lord and God of the universe, who has come to rescue his people like a new and second and final Moses, Jesus praises him. Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! But he still doesn’t get the credit. 

He doesn’t know it by himself. It’s God who has revealed it to him, God who has made it known, God who has revealed the mystery of Jesus’s identity to him. 

And in recognition of the moment, Jesus changes Peter’s name. He makes a pun on the Greek words, “Petra,” rock, and “Petros,” Peter. Don’t ever let anyone tell you Jesus isn’t funny. “You are Petros, Peter, and on this Petra, rock, I will build my church.”

“Hey Rocky, I’m gonna build my church on this rock.” But the emphasis here still doesn’t fall on Peter. It’s not about what a great leader Peter is going to be. It’s not about how perfect he is – because spoiler alert, he absolutely was not. Peter becomes the Rock on which Jesus built and is building his church not because of who he was, but because of who Jesus is.

 Because Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and because God revealed that to Peter and enabled him to make that profession, Peter is the Rock. And if God has revealed it to you, and enabled you to make that profession, you’re a rock too, a rock that God is using to build his kingdom. And God makes a promise, too. He promises that he’s not building in vain. Even if the gates of death and hell try to overrun that kingdom – and they will – they won’t succeed. The God who promised to be there from generation to generation promises that nothing will stand in the way of bringing his kingdom to earth, making it, as we say, on earth as it is in heaven. 

Up till now, he’s kept that promise. He’s kept it through plagues and wars, through seismic shifts in the fabric of society, through more assualts of Hell’s gates than even the history books can keep up with. Despite all the odds, despite our enemies and more often than not our own stupidity, here we are. Despite these last nine months, here we are. Nothing is the same as it was. We could not have imagined our present last year, and next year is even more uncertain than usual. Here we are in an uncertain present, struggling into an unknown future.But even here – especially here – God delights to show us his faithfulness. He delights to open a new chapter and a new promise in your life, Jeff, and in your lives, Mayberry and Bluemont, in your new life together. The gates of Hades, the gates of Death, they’re raging. But from generation to generation,  God shows himself to be the God who is  with us here, wherever “here” is. And here in the Rock churches – made up of physical rocks, yes, but also the spiritual Rocks of those who make the proclamation that Jesus is the Christ, a new thing is happening. A pastor and two churches are coming together to live out that profession and the promises that follow it in a particular time – 2020 – in a particular community. You’re here as a pledge and a witness that even here, even now, God is building his kingdom. 

And of course, you’ve all got dreams, hopes, aspirations, expectations for your time together. Some of them are reasonable and right and achievable, some of them, undoubtedly, will turn out to be fantasy. Jeff isn’t going to manage to be a perfect pastor. 

Bluefield and Mayberry aren’t going to quite manage to be perfect congregations. 

But that won’t matter. Because just like Moses wasn’t really the point, just like Peter wasn’t really the point, y’all aren’t really the point either. The God who promised Moses that he would be I AM to his people from generation to generation, forever, has promised his presence to you as well. The God who promised Peter that the gates of death would not prevail against his church keeps his word to this day. Today, we’re celebrating a new beginning, a new chapter. But it’s a new chapter in an old, old story – the story of God’s faithfulness, his love, and his determination that we all will dwell with him in peace. And in his grace and his mercy, he’s chosen to work that out in you and in your community through your and Jeff’s ministry together, through the confession that Jesus is the Christ, through the small and everyday ways you’re building up rocks for the kingdom. It’s not going to be perfect, but it doesn’t have to be. God will be perfect for you, and from generation to generation, though all the gates of hell oppose him, he will not fail. 

So to the God of all grace, who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish far more abundantly than all we could ask or think, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus, now and forever. Amen.

Charge to the Pastor by Rev. Robert G. McLavey

     Jeff, it is a joy and a privilege to welcome you to the neighborhood.  I came to Floyd—just down the parkway—a little over five years ago.  I, too, came from a large city—Denver, Colorado.  But it did not take long for me to feel at home in the beautiful surroundings of the Blue Ridge Mountains.  The people here are wonderful, and the history is rich.  There is a faithfulness in the people, where you know that God has been at work for a long time, using some real pioneers who either grew up here or came here when the area was a pretty tough place.  But God’s grace is strong, indeed, and we are the beneficiaries of those who have come before us to preach the good news of Jesus Christ.  And that has been true throughout the history of Christ’s church.

     In the Apostle Paul’s letters to Timothy, Paul passes on to his spiritual heir the wisdom accumulated through a life of mission, ministry, and suffering for the gospel.  In 1 Timothy, chapter 6, Paul says, “But you, man of God,…pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.  Fight the good fight of the faith.  Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses.”  In the first chapter of 2 Timothy, Paul says, “What you heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching, with faith and love in Christ Jesus.  Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you—guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.”  And, finally, in the fourth chapter Paul says, “In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge:  Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.”

     Jeff, let me suggest that in this day and age, being a minister of Word and Sacrament is not enough to ensure that Jesus is held up in honor and glory. Yes, preaching the Word and rightly administering the Sacraments are essential parts of our calling, but we also must be living examples of truth.  We must speak with love and authority.  We must call out false teachers who speak with hatred and hypocrisy in the name of Jesus.

     And to do all of this, Jeff, you must take care of yourself.  You need to be fed spiritually, you need to be diligent in getting rest and inspiration, be sure to spend quality time with your wife and family, and you must be certain to take time to be in solitude with God.  As you are surrounded by these beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains, realize that God’s creation is yet another example of his majesty and another testament to his sovereignty.

     Jeff, by accepting a call to these congregations in this community, a great treasure is committed to your care.  The people you serve are the flock of Christ for whom he gave his life.  Therefore, I charge you to never stop loving Jesus the Shepherd, and never cease caring for his sheep.  Labor faithfully on their behalf and do everything in your power to bring all those entrusted to your care to mature faith and the knowledge of God.  Seek to be one with Christ in all you say and do.

     Let me leave you with this delightful thought.  All of us who have studied in seminaries and have prepared for ministry by pouring over books of great theologians have encountered the writings of Karl Barth, the renowned professor at the University of Basel in Switzerland.  He was the most prolific theologian of the twentieth century, and his theology was as complex as it was profound.  But when Barth visited the University of Chicago on a visit to the United States, and as students and scholars crowded around him at a press conference, someone asked, “Dr. Barth, what is the most profound truth you have learned in your studies?”  Without hesitation, he replied, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”

     Jeff, may that be your greatest truth, as well.  Share it with your congregations and the world!

To the glory of God.  Amen.

Charge to the Congregations by Ruling Elder Libby Wilcox

 Friends in Christ, 

There are few words that can express my excitement for this celebration of installation.  As chairman of the PNC, my committee has worked for the past year to find just the right pastor for our churches. With God’s guidance, we have done just that.  Today, I come before you as an Elder, with the charge for both congregations. This day is full of hope for the future. We have discerned in Jeffery Garrison the gifts of preaching and teaching and have called him to serve among and with us. In the Congregational tradition, it is the body of Christ – all of us together – that blesses this installation to ministry. No bishop examines or consecrates this time. It is the spirit of God, through the witnessing congregation that declares the joyful discernment and call of Jeff Garrison as our minister. Your presence here today is a vital expression of our faith. 

But after this sacred celebration ends, then what? This day is not just about Jeff, it is about all of us and how we will partner with Jeff to do God’s work. 

No successful, transformative, healthy ministry is ever a one-person show. If church and pastor are to form a partnership that is strong and enduring, we must honor each other as Christ has already honored us. We are all in this together. Given this, I charge you as God’s gathered people at Mayberry and Bluemont Presbyterian Churches, with these things.

 First, as our years with Jeff unfold, expect to change. That is because the Spirit still broods over us, Christ still walks among us and God still calls us. As our relationship unfolds, time will continue to work changes because all authentic ministry changes us. Expect to be comforted by this as our minister establishes bonds of affection with us, but also challenged and confronted as well.

 Second, remember that we are all called together as the body of Christ for God’s great purposes.  Jeff is not a proxy for our work. God doesn’t need another fan club. God needs workers in the vineyard. Paul reminds us in Ephesians, there is one body and one Spirit and each of us was given Christian gifts…..some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teacher, not for personal glorification but so the saints would be equipped for the work of ministry for the building up of the body of Christ. (Eph. 4) This world, yea, this part of the world needs to know God’s love and grace through each of us. This is a partnership of people and pastor on behalf of a mighty and merciful God. We are embarking on holy work. 

Third, honor Jeff’s ministry. While this is a partnership, there is also a peculiar setting apart that happens when we grant a minister the privilege of our pulpit and he commits to this ministry before a trusting, yearning congregation.  Ministry can be lonely and often there is little to go on to know if you are making a difference. A pastor is more likely to hear the vocal complainers than the quiet supporters, and is under enormous pressure to wade into conflict with wisdom beyond human capability when it gets personal. So honor Jeff’s ministry. Pray for him. Contact him – notes, texts, phone calls, emails, however – contact him with words of encouragement. Thank him for being a preacher, pastor and prophet in our midst. And honor him by challenging him, asking for clarification, sharing your viewpoint. Be full, and real and honest in your support. 

The apostle Paul frequently began his letters with wonderful words of thanksgiving, as here in his letter to the Philippians:   “I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now.” Paul goes on to say, “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.  It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart, for all of you share in God’s grace with me…”. 

 Indeed, today affirms once again that all of us are in God’s grace and are partners in the sharing of the gospel. With joy, thanksgiving and prayer, God’s good work will be manifest among us, if we give thanks for each other, honor each other, and remember that God has called us to this time and place for a reason. May you perceive this with the excitement and hope that only the Spirit can give and may our years together be marked with great faithfulness.  May God Bless all of us !

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Thanksgiving, Joy, & Gratitude

Jeff Garrison
Bluemont and Mayberry Churches
November 22, 2020
Psalm 100
©2020

The sermon taped on Friday in a practice session.
Setting the stage:

         One of my favorite Georgian authors is Ferrol Sams. A physician by trade, he began writing later in his life. I’d read most of his books before moving to Georgia and highly recommend his three-volume memoir. 

In volume two, which is about his college years in the late 1930s, he writes about one of his professors. This professor asked his class how long it takes someone to go from the whining question, “Why me, Lord?” to the mature question, “Why not me, Lord? Both maintain the accent on the word me. But the one negative syllable separates two entirely different philosophies.”[1]

This is a good question. How long does it take to shift our focus from ourselves to God? The intent of the 100th Psalm, which we’ll look at today, is to encourage such a shift. 

After the Scripture Reading:

Joy is essential to the Christian life. It’s a gift from God. It’s not the pursuit of happiness we in Americans so cherish. What we consider as “happiness” is transitory and fragile. Happiness often depends on external circumstances. For me, it might be the Pirates winning the pennant. If that’s the case, I haven’t been happy in a long time. 

You see, happiness is contradictory. Hope rises on the sound of a well hit ball. The crowd holds its collective breath as the ball sails deep. The centerfielder runs and leaps high with his glove extended as he crashes into the wall. He falls to the ground. Then he stands. A grin comes across his face as he pulls the ball from his glove. The home crowd moans. The batter, who for a moment thought he was a hero, kicks the dust and heads toward the dugout. Some win, others lose. Some celebrate, others mope…

The Pirates might be a long shot for the World Series, but this might be the year the Steeler’s take it all. A virtual Superbowl party, anyone? Enough about sports.

Joy in an unshakable and unchanging God

A friend of mine commenting on this passage wrote, “This Psalm tells us that the joy we find in God is unshaken and unchanging because it is based on something lasting and unchanging.”[2]Get that? Something lasting! Yes, there will be plenty of disappointments in life to weight us down, such as homeruns stolen by a talented centerfielder, but true joy has another foundation. 

True joy, of the everlasting variety, is found in God. To quote the prophet Isaiah, “the flower withers, the grass fades, but the word of God will stand forever.”[3] In other words, all we cherish and love in this life will come to an end. Flowers are beautiful only for a few days or maybe a week. Youth lasts but for a few seasons. Friends and loved ones die. If we are looking for eternal happiness in our lives here on earth, we’ll always be disappointed.

Focus on God, on that which is eternal, and we’ll be ready to join the chorus marching into heaven making a joyful noise. “Worship,” as the late Eugene Peterson once said, “is the strategy by which we interrupt our preoccupation with ourselves and attend to the presence of God.”[4]

We should want to worship God, to offer prayers of thanksgiving, to shout praises. Focus on God. True joy is knowing God and that we are loved by our Creator. We are claimed by our maker. 

Psalm 100 is about the joy in God which “is the motive power of faith.” Our joy in God will lift our hearts.[5]

A Psalm of Worship

This a Psalm of worship. It was probably originally sung by the Hebrew people as they gathered in the Jerusalem temple. The first two verses serve as a call to worship. 

Imagine the chief priest standing at the temple’s gate. He’s in his finest robe. Suddenly trumpets blast, quieting the crowd. Then, in a loud voice, the priest summons the multitude: “Make a joyful noise, worship the Lord with gladness, and come into his presence with singing.” The crowd responds, breaking into a round of “Holy, Holy, Holy.” If it’s November, they might sing “Now Thank We All Our God.”

“Know that the Lord is God, that he made us,” the third verse reads. “We are his, the sheep of his pasture.”  We’re reminded why we’ve gathered. Our one purpose is to worship the Almighty. 

God is king, but also a caring shepherd. Those gathered in front of the temple, preparing to enter, recognize they are to put away thoughts of grandeur for themselves. Furthermore, they are to put away petty differences between one another. This is not the place or time for selfishness or bickering. All who have come are to be together, in unity, in worship. 

The same is true for us. We are to leave our petty differences at the door of the sanctuary. Worship isn’t about us; it’s about our God.

The message of Psalm 100

This may be a short Psalm, but it has a wonderful message for those of us who gather Sunday after Sunday to worship. “Psalm 100 initiates worship and sets forth a theology of worship,” according to one commentator.[6] The focus of the Psalm, as we learn in the fourth verse is God. As the final verse indicates, we worship because God is good, loving and faithful.

Gratitude

 A key to being a Christian is gratitude. I don’t know how one can be a Christian and not feel it. Gratitude grows when we have our priorities right. Gratitude is not only good for our souls, it’s good for bodies. 

A few years ago, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal that spoke on what we might do to benefit from this feeling: 

“Gratitude is good for us in many ways. Studies have shown it strengthens our immune systems, helps us sleep better, reduces stress and depression and opens the door to more relationships. But to reap those rewards, we need to do more than feel grateful. ‘The word ‘thanksgiving’ means giving of thanks.’ says Dr. Emmons (a psychologist at University of California at Davis). ‘It is an action word. Gratitude requires action.’”[7]

Did you catch that? Gratitude requires action. We can’t just receive all the goodness God has given us without sharing. This is the meaning behind the secular holiday we celebrate this week. Thanksgiving is to be a time of sharing. The mythology of the holiday, whether or not it happened this way, captures a truth of gratitude. Pilgrims and Natives sharing a meal around the table in an expression of gratitude. 

True gratitude leads to generosity. It’s a personal issue, one that we each need to struggle with and decide for ourselves. Are we generous? Are our lives gracious? Do we love God, our Creator, and want to praise him in thought, word, and deed? 

The Psalm calls us to worship, but our worshipful attitude should be more than just what we do on Sunday morning. Likewise, we should be thankful more than just this Thursday. 

Our thankfulness, our worship, should flow forth from our lives, from our hearts. It’s what should be most evident when others see us. Last night I saw a meme on Facebook in which someone asked an Amish man if he was a Christian. His answer was shocking. “Ask my neighbor,” was his response. Do others see us as Christians? 

This Thanksgiving

In closing, let me say a little bit about this Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, the Center for Disease Control and many physicians are recommending that we not do much sharing around the table this year. Face it, sharing COVID would be a Thanksgiving downer. So maybe we need to revision just how we might share gratitude this year. 

Maybe, instead of stuffing ourselves on turkey and dressing and cranberry sauce, we should spend this Thanksgiving a little quieter. We could spend a few minutes alone with God, reading Psalms of Thanksgiving.[8] We could also make a phone call or two. We could write a letter to a family member we miss seeing or to a long-lost friend. We could support Thanksgiving offerings where the money goes to those in need. 

As we take these actions, remember to give thanks to God for the blessings we have. And let others see your gratitude. Amen.

[1] Ferrol Sams, The Whisper of the River (NY: Penguin Books, 1986), 498. 

[2] Laura Smit, “Come, Let Us Worship and Bow Down,” Reformed Worship, #52 (June 1999), 14.

[3] Isaiah 40:7.

[4] Eugene Peterson was the translator of The Message (a Bible translation) and author of over 30 books on ministry and faith. This quote came from a tweet. (@PetersonDaily, November 12, 2017). 

[5] Artur Weiser, The Psalms, Herbert Hartwell translator, (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962), 645.

[6] James L. Mays, Psalms (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1994), 321

[7] Clare Ansberry, “Cultivating a Life of Gratitude, The Wall Street Journal (November 14, 2017), A15. 

[8] Some additional suggestions of “Thanksgiving Psalms” from Walter Brueggemann, The Message of the Psalms: A Theological Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984), 125-139:  Psalms 30, 40, 138, 34,65, 66, and 124.

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To the glory of God…

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
2 Corinthians 4:5-18
September 27, 2020

          It’s hard to know what to say on my last Sunday in this pulpit. I appreciate the privilege of having been able to proclaim God’s word to you in sermons, in the classes I’ve taught, in addition to the conversations I’ve had with many of you over the past six plus years. It’s always a pleasure to attempt to open up a bit about what God might be doing in the world. God is active even now in our midst. We are a people who live by faith in a God whose glory often remains hidden, but we trust the Lord because of what we know about God through Jesus Christ.

          I went back yesterday and looked at the first sermon I preached from this pulpit. My text was Revelation 1:4-8. Yes, I started at the end of the book, it’s a bad habit of mine. I recalled a sermon Sam Henderson, your interim pastor, had preached a few weeks early. Sam claimed there was no perfect pastor. I thanked Sam for lowering the bar. But you know, he’s right. None of us are perfect. Nor is it about us, me, or whoever is standing in this pulpit. It’s all about the glory of God as revealed in the truth of Jesus Christ. Our purpose is to proclaim that truth.

          Today, I’m using a passage from Second Corinthians. Of the letters we have in the New Testament, Paul wrote more to the Corinthians than to any other church. He also spent a year and a half in Corinth, ministering to the people there. He wrote at least three letters, although only two survive, both of which are in the Canon of Scripture.[1]

          Paul has been held in high esteem over the centuries. He’s responsible for much of the New Testament. But if you read his letters you get the sense that not everyone appreciated him during his lifetime. We joke about Paul putting people asleep during his sermons, but then I’m sure most of you would be asleep if I tried to preach through the night and into the early morning hours.[2] But Paul was also questioned over his authority. While he was called by Jesus on the Damascus Road,[3] Paul was not one of the disciples who was personally with Jesus during his ministry. There were tensions between Jewish believers and Paul,[4] who was called to the Gentiles, as well as tensions between Paul and other missionaries.[5]   

There were also other unknown conflicts Paul had, including one in Corinth, which must have been painful both to Paul and to some within the church.[6] In this letter, Paul encourages the church to forgive this individual, while defending his role as an Apostle of Jesus Christ.

          For Paul, such things are not to be taken personally, for in doing so could diminish God’s glory. Everything is to be done with God in mind. This is why Paul makes such a strong case for depending on God’s strength. As humans, we’re limited. We are frail. We fail. Like Paul realized in his own situation, there may have been things I said and done that have offended some of you. For that, I’m sorry. It’s not an excuse, but I also realize it’s a part of who we are as creatures. We’re not perfect, which is why we are not to be boastful about what we’ve done, only about what God has done and is doing through us. Humility must rule in the life of a Christian.

          In the seventh verse, Paul speaks of treasure in clay pots. In Paul’s day, clay pots along with baskets were the main thing people had to store stuff in. Today, we have cardboard boxes—right now in my office and home, there are a hundred or more such boxes. Like the clay pots of Paul’s day, cardboard boxes are not valuable. They’re cheap and expendable (but I hope you recycle them). Cardboard boxes protect that which is inside, which may be valuable—my books and the china.

          Paul uses clay pots (and we could use cardboard boxes) as a metaphor for flesh. Boxes and pots can be easily broken and destroyed, just like our bodies. But there is one thing important about our bodies, it’s in the body that we experience God’s grace and glory. Just as it was in the flesh that Jesus came to us. As frail as we may be, and as flawed as we may be, God sees something of value within us and works through us. The treasure that Paul speaks of is the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.[7]

          Anything that we do that’s worthwhile isn’t because of our own power and strength, knowledge and wisdom. It’s because our Creator has given us such abilities. Paul’s point is that anyone looking at him would not think he was capable of being the world’s greatest missionary, and they’re right. He was not capable, but with God working through him Paul was able to do incredible things.[8]

          After speaking of clay pots, Paul moves into a powerful set of contradictions in verses 8 and 9:

  • afflicted, but not crushed,
  • perplexed but not driven to despair,
  • persecuted but not forsaken,
  • struck down, but not destroyed.

Paul leaves no doubt that any success he’s enjoyed did not come from him, but from God! Paul may have said this because other teachers have come along and claimed to be superior or to have better gifts than Paul. But Paul isn’t having any of that. He can do what he can do, because of God working through him.[9]

          This long section of the letter, which began back in chapter 2 with Paul saying he forgave whoever it was that had abused him, now comes back to the idea of God and God’s mission of which Paul, like us, is just a vessel. My purpose here, as it has been at every congregation I’ve served as a pastor, is not to proclaim greatness, but to humble myself before you and God and point to God as revealed in Jesus Christ as our only hope in life and death.[10]

          In verse 16, Paul moves from his defense of himself, to include everyone when he says, “So we do not lose heart.” Paul’s not just be writing about himself here, he’s writing about us all. And he reminds us that our hope isn’t in this life, which is temporary, but in the life to come, a life with God who is redeeming heaven and earth. Paul would never say that our work here is not important. It is, because we are working with God to redeem a fallen world. And it’s not our abilities that make our work important, but our Creator, the one who has redeemed us and who works through us to spread this message.

          So friends, my message to you today hasn’t changed any since I first preached here over six years ago. Keep your eyes focused on Jesus. Be a light and a beacon for him. May your actions be worthy of him and your words be uplifting and loving. Yes, we live in a mixed-up world with lots of trouble, but that’s no excuse for bad behavior, for while we live in this world, we live for the world to come. Love everyone, extend grace to all, be quick to forgive, and humble yourselves before the God who has created you, who redeems you, and who sustains you. Amen.

©2020

[1] See 1 Corinthians 5:9 for the reference to an earlier letter (before 1 & 2 Corinthians).

[2] Acts 20:7-12.

[3] Acts 9:1-18.

[4] See Acts 15.

[5] For an example, see 1 Corinthians 1:10-17.

[6] See 2 Corinthians 2:5-8.

[7] Paul Barnett, NICNT: The Second Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1997), 229.

[8] Charles Barrett, HNTC: The Second Epistle to the Corinthians (1973: Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1983), 138.

[9] Barnet, 231.

[10] See the Presbyterian Church, Book of Confessions, Heidelberg Catechism, question 1.

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The Resurrection, Parts 2 & 3

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
April 19, 2020
John 20:19-29

 

Throughout this Easter Season, we’re looking at post-resurrection stories of Jesus. We find these mostly in the gospels of Luke and John. As we left off last week, Jesus had risen and had appeared to Mary Magdalene. He sent her off on a mission to tell the disciples. Prior to her arrival, all they know is that Jesus’ tomb is open, and his body is gone. They are fearful, worrying that they may end up facing the same kind of death Jesus’ endured. But that changes.

What is this resurrection about? What does it mean for us, today? In Richard Rohr’s devotional this week, he quoted Franciscan sister and scientist Ilia Delio:

Christianity can help us realize that death and resurrection are part of the evolutionary path toward wholeness; letting go of isolated existence for the sake of deeper union. Something dies but something new is born—which is why the chaos of our times is, in a strange way, a sign of hope; something new is being born within.[1]

Is this a time of hope? In this time of pandemic, what do we need to let go of? How might we become more whole? How might we develop a deeper union with Christ? Our text provides some suggestions.

We’re continuing to look at art to help us get into the Scriptures. Today’s painting, of Thomas checking out Jesus’ wounds, is by Caravaggio, an Italian painter of the late 16th and early 17th Century. Let’s get into the head of the other disciple looking over Thomas in this depiction of the event. What do you think was going on in his mind?

Like Thomas, I also have doubts. I was just not willing to speak up. Can this really be Jesus? After all, his body was so broken when they pulled him off the cross. Yet, he’s now in front of us. Jesus insists that Thomas, who doubted when they said Jesus had risen from the dead, stick his finger into his wound. I’m watching. Thomas is reluctant, but Jesus grabs his wrist and pulls his hand toward the wound. Can this really be the same Jesus, that just a little over a week ago, hung on a cross?  And is he the same Jesus we followed throughout Galilee? Will people believe us when we tell what we’ve experienced? I no longer understand what is happening, but I know that nothing will ever be the same.

Let us read from the gospel of John, chapter 20, beginning with verse 19.

 

          What a week it. From the Parade to the cross and now on the evening of the first day of a new week, the disciples gather in secret. The doors are locked. Everyone is exhausted. Fright and fatigue show on their faces. After three years, they only have each other. And now there’s a rumor going around, started by Mary Magdalene, that Jesus is alive. Some think it possible, but others believe it’s just idle tale?”[2]

        And then suddenly, as the sun sinks in the West, Jesus appears. How did he get through the locked doors? But here he is, when he belongs, in the middle of the middle of the gathered disciples. Jesus was the one who unites the disciples. He’s always in the middle. He was even in the middle of those crucified on Friday. The middle is where Jesus belongs.[3] Remember that!

Holding up his hands, greeting his friends, Jesus says: “Peace be with you.” What a sight! The nail holes are evident. There’s a rip in his side where the Roman spear was thrust. The fatigue on their faces disappear, but the fright remains.

Again, Jesus says: “Peace be with you,” only this time he continues, telling them that just as he was sent by the Father, he’s sending them out into the world. The unique thing about the resurrection is that Jesus speaks to the disciples as if they are his equals and able to continue in his mission. Then, reminiscence of God blowing breath into the nostrils of the clay figure there in the Garden, giving life to Adam, Jesus blows upon the disciples.[4] Obviously, they weren’t worried about COVID-19.

A week later, the disciples are again in the house… Again, it’s the first day of the week, Sunday, the day after the Jewish Sabbath, the day of resurrection, the primary day that most Christians worship.[5] Again, the doors are locked. The shades are pulled… So much for Jesus’ command to go out into the world… It’s been a week since they’ve seen the resurrected Christ, with his wounds still visible, yet they’re still hiding, still afraid for their lives, still afraid to go out into the world…  Then Jesus reappears. And, where is he? Standing there among the disciples—in the middle—where Jesus belongs.

Thomas, the empiricist who wants to see, sense, and touch Jesus before he commits himself to believing is also present. Knowing this, Jesus invites Thomas to place his finger in his wounds… Imagine Thomas reaching out his hand. And then he sees. In awe, Thomas cries out, “My Lord and my God!”

         We could argue that this is the climax of John’s gospel. “My Lord and my God,” acknowledges that Jesus is more than the Messiah. We get a whiff of this in Matthew’s gospel where we’re told the women at the tomb worshipped Jesus.[6] We don’t worship a person; we worship God. Thomas takes this a step further and declares that Jesus is God. His confession has gone beyond all other confessions of the disciples up to this point.[7] A doubter at first, Thomas is the first disciple to recognize Jesus as more than a teacher. Jesus is God. Furthermore, Thomas’ proclamation is a political statement. Roman emperors were addressed as “Our lord and god.” Here, Thomas confesses who truly is Lord and God, and it’s not Caesar or anyone else to whom we might be lured into professing allegiance.[8] By calling Jesus Lord, Thomas asserts Jesus is worthy to obey. By calling Jesus God, Thomas declares that Jesus should be worshipped, as we’re doing today.

N. T. Wright suggests that Thomas serves as a parable for our need to both have the historical and scientific facts. He wanted to touch, to experience, and to see. But when he claims Jesus to be God, he transcends the historical and scientific realm into something “higher and richer.” We’re into a new creation.[9]

         What all this means to us, today, two millenniums after the resurrection? Jesus’ last words in this passage are interesting. It’s a blessing on us. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” Jesus says.  Did you hear that?  He’s talking about you and me; he’s blessing those of us who have not had an opportunity to stick our fingers into his wounds. Instead of seeing, we believe due to the presence of the Holy Spirit and the testimony of others who have felt Jesus’ presence in their lives. And because we have faith in Jesus Christ, we’re to listen to his teachings and to live lives that strive to glorify him. That’s the challenge we have, as individuals, to listen to Jesus and to live faithful.

       Furthermore, as a community of believers, we’re able to offer forgive sins. That’s quite a task. You know, there are a lot of good things that the church does in the community that other groups can also do, and in some cases these groups can even do it better than the church. But there is one thing that no other group can do. The government can’t do it, civic clubs can’t do it, political parties can’t do it—and that’s forgive sins. As God, Jesus has this power and he grants it to his church. For this reason, the church is an essential business. But the church isn’t a building; the church is wherever God’s people are at, which now, hopefully, is in the safety of our homes.

There’s a lot of hope in this passage. We have a God who can do incredible things and I believe God is doing that right now. This pandemic is offering us a chance to pause and re-evaluate our lives and what is important. We have plenty of time as we sit around the house watching TV and reading novels. But just remember this, the church isn’t here in this building, it’s where you and all the other believers are located. And, more importantly, as it was in that first Easter, and the next Sunday, Jesus needs to be present, in the middle of us. It’s easy to be depress these days, but Jesus is here, ready to give us strength and hope and encouragement. While this pandemic might suggest that it’s not safe to invite people into our homes, the exception is Jesus. Invite him into your home. Spend time with him during these weeks of isolation, asking him what you might learn from this time. For Jesus is not in the grave, he’s descended to the Father, but he’s left behind his Spirit to guide and comfort us. And for that, we should be thankful.  Amen.

©2020

[1] https://cac.org/death-transformed-2020-04-12/?utm_source=cm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dm&utm_content=summary

[2] Luke 24:11, “and these words seemed to be an idle tale.”  John’s gospel only tells about Jesus’ encounter with Mary Magdalene prior to meeting his disciples later in the day.  See John 20:1-19.

[3] Frederick Dale Bruner, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 1162.

[4] See Genesis 2:7.

[5] Christians worship on the first day of the week because the Lord rose that Day (John 20) and the Holy Spirit descended upon the church on that day (Acts 2:1ff). See also 1 Corinthians 16:2.

[6] Matthew 28:9.

[7] As an example, the climax in Mark’s gospel comes with Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Messiah, but Thomas makes a stronger Christological statement, proclaiming that Jesus is also God. See Mark 8:29.

[8] Raymond Brown, The Gospel According to John XIII-XXI: The Anchor Bible (New York: Doubleday, 1970), 1047.

[9] N. T. Wright, Surprised by Scripture: Engaging Contemporary Issues (New York: HarperOne, 2014), 60.

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Where do our loyalties belong?

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
Matthew 22:15-22
March 15, 2020

 

 

        If you read the entirety of Matthew 22 (and with the extra time we may be having on hand as everything is being cancelled because of the Coronavirus, it’s not a bad idea), you’d witness a masterful campaign to trap Jesus. But Jesus isn’t so easy to catch. He’s kind of like Stonewall Jackson in the Valley Campaign in the spring of 1862. Jackson faced much larger armies who wanted to trap and do him in.[1] Similarly, with Jesus during Passion week, he’s confronted with a large number out to destroy him. But Jesus doesn’t fall in their traps. Jesus bewilders his enemies.

         What’s happened is that unlikely groups join together to challenge Jesus. The old cliché, “politics make strange bedfellows,” rings true. Groups who wouldn’t normally give each other the time of day have come together to take on Jesus. They sense that Jesus is challenging the existing order. You have a few Herodians, who are Jews who believe they’re be better off cooperating with the Romans. They take their name from Herod, who had Jewish blood but worked for the Empire. And you have the Pharisees; a group of seriously committed religious leaders who believe in the resurrection. Theologically, they’re most like Jesus, but Jesus constantly challenges them and exposes their hypocrisy.

        What we read this morning could be described as one movement in a tag-team wrestling match. The Herodians and the Pharisees team up on Jesus.[2] Once they are dismissed, in the next passage we have the Sadducees, the conservatives of the day, crawl up on the mat.[3] According to most translations, Jesus’ “silenced them,” but the original language is a bit harsher. A better translation would be that Jesus “muzzled” them.[4] Think of muzzling a dog!  Jesus is on a roll! But the Pharisee’s still come back for more.

    So what is Jesus telling us in this passage? Do you remember those big posters that use to sit out in front of the Post Office and government buildings with Uncle Sam pointing his finger and saying: “I want you!” I believe we could easily surmise this text into a big poster of God saying: “I want you!”

Let’s now look deeper into the passage. We’re told that the Pharisees are plotting to entrap Jesus. How does Jesus know this? We could say that because he was God he knew, but that explanation does not uphold the human side of Jesus. The human side of Jesus would have realized something was up when he saw the Pharisees and the supporters of Herod walking hand in hand.

These two unlikely groups approach Jesus. They try to butter him up a little by telling Jesus he’s sincere, he speaks the truth, and that he is impartial. This Jesus’ second clue. “For flattery is on their lips, but their heart is set on their gain,” we read in Ezekiel.[5] Most of us, I would expect, are smart enough to realize something fishy is up when those who have nothing to do with us began to butter us up. And that’s what happens here. With compliments, they try to catch Jesus off-guard before snapping the trap with their sixty-four thousand dollar question.

         “Tell me,” they ask, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”  Jesus has to be careful. Last week you heard Deanie preach about the revolutionary act of Jesus cleaning the temple. Now they want Jesus to make a revolutionary statement against the civil authorities. If Jesus says they should not pay taxes, the Herodians could have him arrested for treason. But then, if he says to pay the taxes, the Pharisees can attack him for not being a patriotic Jew.[6] It’s almost a no-win situation.

          Jesus asks them for a coin. Unlike us, he didn’t have to worry about where that’s coin has been or picking up some a virus from its surface. However, Jesus still has to be careful. The disciples, we know, had a common purse and he could have gone there to fetch a coin, but then the Pharisees might have charged him with toting around an engraved image of the emperor.[7] So Jesus has them to look at a coin they are carrying, and he asks them whose picture is on it…. They reply, “Caesar’s.” Jesus then flips the coin back to them, saying give Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to give God what is God’s. The little band of tempters are astonished. They are amazed. They don’t know what to say, so they leave.

These men are amazed, but do they understand all that Jesus says? They hear “Give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s,” but do they hear “Give unto God what is God’s.” Do they understand what Jesus meant? Probably not for they continue their attempts to attack Jesus throughout this chapter. But let’s not worry about them. How about us? Do we hear what Jesus is saying? Back to that revised army poster of Uncle Sam saying, “I want you!” Jesus is saying, “God wants us!”

The coin had an image on it, Caesar’s, therefore give it to him. In Genesis, we’re told we’re created by God, in God’s image.[8] The coin belongs to Caesar, it bears his image; our lives belong to God, they contain God’s image.  Caesar may have a lien on our possessions while we’re on earth, but God has a lien on our total being—now and forever.  God is calling us to dedicate our lives. God, in Jesus Christ, is in that poster pointing, and saying, “I want you.

        Give to God what is God’s.  This phrase is often overlooked.  We tend to get hung up on what is Caesar’s and what is ours. We get hung up on the petty details and we miss the important question. What does it mean for us to give ourselves to God?

Sure, a part of devoting ourselves to God is about money, but it’s more than that. Money is only a start for God wants and expects much more from us. God wants us to trust him and then to do what we can to live in a manner that will further God’s work in the world. If we believe that we are owned by God and not Caesar, our lives should reflect such faith. If we believe that we belong to God, and are in God’s hands, we have nothing to fear, not even the Coronavirus. For regardless of what happens to us on this earth, God has us in his hand and is working out all things for good.[9] That may be hard to believe considering that panic that is going on around us, but it’s true. It’s why Christians for the past two thousand years have risked their lives and their well-being on behalf of others. Yes, we can give Caesar what is Caesars. But we can also take risk and do what is right and noble and good because we have trust in God.

         Earlier I mentioned Stonewall Jackson, whose biography I’m currently reading. But let me tell you two other Civil War stories, they’re both short, and demonstrate this point. At the Battle of Shiloh in the spring of 1862, Albert Sidney Johnson led the Confederate troops as they overwhelmed the Union forces near Pittsburg Landing along the Tennessee River. It was a bloody day and the Union lines were broken in places. During a lull in the first day of battle, Johnson, seeing a number of wounded Union soldiers in need, ordered his surgeon to set up an aid station and to tend to their needs. According to Shelby Foote in his novel about the battle, his surgeon, Dr. Yandell protested. Johnson cut him off saying “These men were our enemies a moment ago. They are our prisoners now. Take care of them.” A few minutes later, a stray bullet struck Johnson’s leg and without medical aid, he quickly bled to death.[10] To this day, there is debate as to whether or not Johnson’s death caused the tide of the battle to turn. But the tide did turn and General Grant became a national hero.

          A second story comes from the city of Wilmington during the Civil War. In 1862, a blockade runner that had come in from the Caribbean brought Yellow Fever to the town. Those who could fled to the country, but several of the pastors and the leading citizens of the town stayed behind, feeling it was their Christian obligation to help out the victims. Over 400 people died of Yellow Fever that fall, including many of those who intentionally stayed to care for the dying.[11]

Of course, with the current threat we face, we need to think about our response. We need to help when and where we can, but we also need to be wise enough not to become a carrier of the disease. So while mercy might call us to act boldly, it also might call us to isolate ourselves (especially if we’ve been recently travelling and could have potentially been exposed to the illness). Such isolation might help slow the spread of the disease and, with the phone and the internet, there are many other ways that we can read out to those for whom we care and love. The Christian faith calls us to be brave, after all we don’t belong to ourselves but to God. But it also calls us to be wise!

      Give to God what is God’s, is the message here. So yes, we should pay our income tax. And when you write that check this April, we might remember that giving Caesar his due can be a lot easier than giving to God what is his. For our whole life belongs to God. But then, God’s given us life and in Jesus Christ has redeemed us to be his people. That’s a debt we can’t repay, nor is such repayment expected. As the old hymn goes, “Jesus paid it all.”[12]  Amen.

 

©2020

[1] I have been reading S. C. Gwynne, Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson (New York: Scribner, 2014).

[2] Matthew 22:15-22.

[3] Matthew 23-33

[4]  Frederick Dale Bruner, The Churchbook: Matthew 13-28 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 410.

[5] Ezekiel 33:31b.

[6] Bruner, 397.

[7] Bruner, 398.

[8] Genesis 1:27.

[9] Romans 8:28.

[10] Shelby Foote, Shiloh (1952, New York: Vintage Books, 1991), 199.

[11] James Sprunt, Chronicles of the Cape Fear River, 1660-1916 (1919: Wilmington, NC: Dram Tree Books, 2005), 286-288.

[12] “Jesus Paid it All,” Elvira Hall (1865).

Posted on

Looking with Gratitude

 

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
Acts 4:32-35
November 24, 2019

“The story of Jesus doesn’t end with Jesus,” Eugene Peterson writes in Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places. The Christian story continues on in this community and in all communities where people gather to “repent, believe and follow.” Nor does “the supernatural doesn’t stop with Jesus. God’s salvation, which became articulate, visible, and particular in Jesus, continues to be articulate, and particular in the men and women who have been raised to new life in him, the community of the resurrection.”[1]

Ponder the implication of this for a moment. We are a part of a movement that began 20 centuries ago in an obscure part of the world. Christ is still alive, working in his church, whether it’s here on Skidaway Island or in some remote city in China or a hamlet in the savannahs of Africa. Today, the question for us to ponder is this: “what should this community look like?”

In my reading over the past few weeks in preparation for the stewardship campaign, I came across this indictment of the modern church in America:

“One of the reasons churches in North America have trouble guiding people about money is that the church’s economy is built on consumerism. If churches see themselves as suppliers of religious goods and services and their congregants as consumers, then offerings are ‘payments.’”[2]

 

Contrary to what we often think, the church is not to be a supplier of religious goods and services. The church is to be a fellowship that brings people together under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Our offerings are to be signs of our gratitude for what God has done for us. To get a good idea of what the church should look like, let’s go back to the first century and consider the church in Jerusalem at the very beginning. Luke paints an interesting picture of this community who pinned their hoped and placed their faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It’s a community of people filled with gratitude. I am reading today’s passage from the Message translation and will put the words on the screens. Read Acts 4:32-35:

 

        I will always be indebted to the congregation in Virginia City, Nevada, a place where I first experienced ministry on my own as a student pastor for a year. The church on the Comstock, at least in the modern era, has always been small. But there was something about the fellowship of that group that made it an attractive place for all kinds of people. The people in the church worked hard together, keeping the church going, which was quite a task in a wooden building built in 1866. But they also worked hard to help one another. And they tried to help others, sending clothes to an orphanage in Mexico and collecting food for a pantry in Carson City.

Every month, this congregation gathered for a dinner party. People from all walks of life came together to enjoy one another’s company. Its appeal was magnetic for there was plenty of laughter at these gatherings.

One of the more colorful townsfolk was a guy named Bob. He could be best described as a skid-row drunk. He lived in a shack outside of town and mostly stayed mostly to himself. But you’d see him several times a day, winding through town, often going down the alleys where he dug through the trash from the bars. He’d eat leftovers, but what he was really after was the dregs of alcohol that remained in the bottles thrown away. Bob would pour these drops into a gallon jar that he toted around with him. Even with its high concentration of alcohol, this was a nasty cocktail none of us would consider drinking.

One evening we had a dinner at the church. As I was walking down the boardwalk, I came upon Bob. I’d been there a few months by this point, so I knew people would be okay with his presence, so I invited him in. He thanked me but wouldn’t come in. I then offered to fix him a plate of food, which he again turned down. One of the women in the church who was walking up the boardwalk, overheard my conversation. She told me that Bob had been invited many times, but would never come in, but suggested we fix him a plate and sit it on the steps. Bob didn’t want to be fussed over, but he would most likely pick up and eat a plate of food if sat out. And that’s what happened. The first plate fixed that evening was for Bob. We covered it with foil and let it at the top of the steps. When we left that evening, the plate was empty.

Virginia City had never been known as a religious place, but that’s okay because our faith isn’t as much about religion as it is about relationships. Our faith manifest itself by being kind and generous and, as we talk about here at SIPC, reflecting the face of Jesus. There was no need for Bob to be uncomfortable inside the church building. We could still provide him a good meal. As a church, we must be willing to meet people where they are at, and not demand that they conform to our ideas or go where we want them to be.

         The congregation Luke describes here near the beginning of the book of Acts wasn’t spectacular. It wouldn’t be considered particularly successful according to modern business practices. The fellowship didn’t include the leading folks of Jerusalem. Everyone was poor and marginalized. They didn’t have any glitzy advertising or even a fancy sign out front. After all, they tried to blend in and not stand out because there were those didn’t appreciate their message. But, despite all this, there was something magnetic about this community. They were generous and gracious. They were willing to help each other and to forgive others for the wrongs they’ve done because they’d experienced forgiveness in Jesus Christ. It was this magnetic appeal that drew folks to the church. Why else would someone risk persecutions and isolation by becoming a Christian?

Let’s look at this passage. What they owned wasn’t important. They knew the truth of the Psalmist who proclaimed, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it.”[3] Instead of holding tight to possessions they knew belonged to God, they willingly shared with one another. They had set their minds on the glorious resurrection of Jesus and knew that was all that mattered. So, they attempted to do what they could to do for others which meant that no one in the fellowship was needy. Because of what God had done for them, they were filled with gratitude and willing to help others.

        I recently read an article on why we need to make a weekly commitment to attend church. I’ll post this article I my next e-news. It was written by a young widow who describes the church as “the sweetest fellowship this side of heaven.” Her husband died suddenly one night after having been taken to the hospital by an ambulance for shortness of breath. She was left with seven kids. Before leaving the hospital, she called a friend from church. By the time she was home, the friend was there to sit with her. Others came in to grieve, to bring meals, to help clean the house, fix broken appliances and cars, and to minister to and pray for her and her children. The church is not always perfect, she notes. At times, the church can be even cruel. But when we live up to our calling to reflect Jesus’ face to the world, we demonstrate what was described in our passage today. The church can be the sweetest fellowship this side of heaven.[4]

There are two essential traits we need to foster in our lives to help the church grow in this direction: generosity and graciousness. Think about your life and ask yourself, how generous are you? How gracious are you? What can you do to become more generous and gracious?

          Friends, today we receive our estimate of giving offerings for 2020, which is a sign of one half of that last question—how generous we are. We are encouraged to grow in generosity. As Vic Bell suggested last week, we’re to take a step toward being more generous, as we strive to become the church described in Acts. I pray that you will be generous and continue to take steps in this direction. But just as important as generosity is, don’t forget to be graciousness. On your walk with Christ, show grace to one another, just as God has been gracious with us. Realize what God has done and commit yourselves to do what? Say it after me… To be more being generous and gracious.  Amen.

 

©2019

[1] Eugene H. Peterson, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 267.

[2] Doug Pagitt from a lists of stewardship quotes that was in an old file of mine.

[3] Psalm 24:1.

[4] https://www.ibelieve.com/faith/5-reasons-you-need-to-make-church-a-weekly-commitment.html